Isabella Bird - Journeys in Persia and Kurdistan, Volume 1 (of 2)

The Governor, recognising the craze of Europeans for exercise, sent word that M – might walk in the balcony of the haram if I went to chaperon him, and this great concession was gladly accepted, for it was the only possible way of getting warm. The apparition of a strange man, and a European, within the precincts of the haram was a great event, and every window, curtain, and doorway was taken advantage of by bright dark eyes sparkling among folds of cotton and gauze. The enjoyment was surreptitious, but possibly all the more keen, and sounds of whispering and giggling surged out of every crevice. There are over thirty women, some of them negresses. Some are Kurds and very handsome, but the faces of the two handsomest, though quite young, have something fiendish in their expression. I have seldom seen a haram without its tragedies of jealousy and hate, and every fresh experience makes me believe that the system is as humiliating to men as it is to women.

The haram reception-rooms here are large and bright, with roofs and cornices worked daintily in very white plaster, and there are superb carpets on the floors, and divans covered with Damascus embroidery in gold silk on cream muslin.

Each day the demands for my presence in the sick-room are more frequent, and though I say that I can scarcely aspire to be a nurse, they persist in thinking that I am a Hakīm , and possibly a useful spy on the doctor. I have become aware that unscrupulous jealousy of the principal wife exists, and, as is usual in the East, everybody distrusts everybody else, and prefers to trust strangers. The husband frequently asks me to remove what seems a cancerous tumour, and the doctor says that an operation is necessary to save the lady's life, but when I urge him to perform it, and offer a nurse's help, he replies that if she were to die he would be at once accused of murder, and would run a serious risk.

The Governor to-day was so anxious that I should persuade the lady to undergo an operation that he even brought Hadji into the room to interpret what I said in Arabic. His ceaseless question is, "Will she die?" and she asks me the same many times every day. She insists that I shall be present each day when the wound is dressed, and give help, lest the doctor without her leave should plunge a knife into the swelling. These are most distressing occasions, for an hour of struggle and suffering usually ends in delirium.

This afternoon, however, she was much freer from pain, and sent for me to amuse her. She wore some fine jewels, and some folds of tinselled gauze round her head, and looked really handsome and intelligent. Her husband wished that we could converse without his imperfect interpreting, and repeated many times, "She is a learned woman, and can write and read several languages." The room was as usual full of women, who had removed their veils at their lord's command. I showed the lady some Tibetan sketches, but when I came to one of a man the women replaced their veils!

When I showed some embroidery, the Governor said he had heard that the Queen of England employed herself with her needle in leisure hours, but that it is not comme il faut here for ladies to work. It seems that the making of sweetmeats is the only occupation which can be pursued without loss of dignity. Is it wonderful that intolerable ennui should be productive of the miserable jealousies, rivalries, intrigues, and hatreds which accompany the system of polygamy?

The host, although civil governor of a large district, also suffers from ennui . The necessary official duties are very light, and the accounts and reports are prepared by others. If money is wanted he makes "an exaction" on a village, and subordinates screw it out of the people. Justice, or the marketable commodity which passes for such, is administered by a kadi . He clatters about the balconies with slippered feet, is domestic, that is, he spends most of the day in the haram , smokes, eats two meals of six or seven courses each, and towards evening takes a good deal of wine, according to a habit which is becoming increasingly common among the higher classes of Moslems. He is hospitable, and is certainly anything but tyrannical in his household.

The customs and ways of the first Turkish house I have visited in would be as interesting to you as they were to myself, but it would be a poor return for hospitality to dwell upon anything, unless, like the difficulties regarding the illness of the principal wife, it were a matter of common notoriety.

It is a punishable act in Persia, and possibly here also, to look into a neighbour's house, but I cannot help it unless I were to avoid the window altogether. Wealth and poverty are within a few feet of each other, and as Moslems are charitable to a degree and in a manner which puts us to shame, the juxtaposition is advantageous.

My neighbour's premises consist of a very small and mean yard, now a foot deep in black mire, a cow-shed, and a room without door or windows, with a black uneven floor, and black slimy rafters – neither worse nor better than many hovels in the Western Isles of Scotland. A man in middle life, a woman of dubious age, two girls from eight to ten years old, and a boy a little older are the occupants. The furniture consists of some wadded quilts, a copper pot, an iron girdle, a clay ewer or two, a long knife, a wooden spoon, a clay receptacle for grain, two or three earthenware basins, glazed green, and a wicker tray. The cow-shed contains – besides the cow, which is fed on dried thistles – a spade, an open basket, and a baggage pad. A few fowls live in the house, and are disconcerted to find that they cannot get out of it without swimming.

The weather is cold and raw, fuel is enormously dear, work is at a standstill, and cold and ennui keep my neighbours in bed till the day is well advanced. "Bed" consists of a wadded quilt laid on the floor, with another for a covering. The man and boy sleep at one end of the room, the woman and girls at the other, with covered heads. None make any change in their dress at night, except that the man takes off the pagri of his turban, retaining only a skull cap.

The woman gets up first, lights a fire of tamarisk twigs and thistles in a hole in the middle of the floor, makes porridge of some coarse brownish flour and water, and sets it on to warm – to boil it, with the means at her disposal, is impossible. She wades across the yard, gives the cow a bunch of thistles, milks it into a basin, adds a little leaven to the milk, which she shakes in a goat skin till it is thick, carries the skin and basket to the house, feeds the fowls from the basket, and then rouses her lord. He rises, stretches himself, yawns, and places himself cross-legged by the fire, after putting on his pagri . The room is dense with pungent wood smoke, which escapes through the doorway, and only a few embers remain. The wife hands him an earthen bowl, pours some porridge into it, adds some "thick milk" from the goat skin, and stands before him with her arms crossed while he eats, then receives the bowl from his hands and kisses it, as is usual with the slaves in a household.

Then she lights his pipe, and while he enjoys it she serves her boy with breakfast in the same fashion, omitting the concluding ceremony, after which she and the girls retire to a respectful distance with the big pot, and finish its contents simultaneously. The pipe over, she pours water on her lord's hands, letting it run on the already damp floor, and wipes them with her chadar . No other ablution is customary in the house.

Poor as this man is, he is a Hadji, and having brought from Mecca a "prayer stone," with the Prophet's hand upon it, he takes it from his girdle, puts it on the floor, bows his forehead on it, turning Mecca-ward, and says his prayers, repeating his devotions towards evening. The first day or two he went out, but the roads now being almost impassable, he confines himself to the repairing of a small dyke, which keeps the water from running into the room, which is lower than the yard, and performs its duty very imperfectly, the soak from the yard and the drip from the roof increasing the sliminess hourly. These repairs, an occasional pipe, and much sleep are the record of this man's day till an hour before sunset, when the meal of the morning is repeated with the addition of some cheese.